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Edge Charring of Wood Based Materials when Laser Vector Cut
According to my laser manufacturer’s sales blurb, wood is the most commonly used material for vector cutting.
If that is so, then am I alone in getting the following results ?
I have conducted hundreds of tests on many types of wood based materials – plywood, medium density fibreboard (mdf), hardboard and cardboard, with thicknesses ranging from 0.6mm to 6mm.
The majority of these materials leave a loose, sooty deposit (charring ?) on the cut edge. Handling the cut pieces leaves black marks on the end user’s hands which is clearly unacceptable. Even some materials sold as suitable for laser cutting don’t cut cleanly.
The settings of the laser system driver software, the focus distance, the use of air assist, the use of nitrogen assist, the use of a honeycomb grid, other means of supporting the material and increasing the extraction air flow rate all have had little or no effect on the results found.
The species of wood(s) used to manufacture the product only seem to affect the effective cutting speed, presumably because they have different densities and different amounts of natural resins.
The type and amount of glue (adhesive) and/or resin used in the manufacture of the materials tested is the only thing which seems to make any significant difference to the amount of soot produced.
Before I ramble on about the different types of glue, speed of cut, etc. does anyone else have any thoughts on this subject ?
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3 Replies
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Hi
i have sold my laser now so its been a while, but i’m sure that if you turn down the power & speed you will get the desired result. Are you running at 100% power? at the momentKev
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could you try masking the wood with low tack conform tape and peeling off after its been cut – that’s what I do when rastering it.
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My laser is an Epilog Mini with the optimum PPI, power, speed, focus, number of passes etc. set for each type of material.
These are determined from a large number of tests and each material requires different parameters.
I cut 12" by 18" sheets and, as far as I know, real wood is not available in sheets as large as this, apart from veneer which is to thin.
All my tests relate to man-made materials such as plywood and mdf and involve cutting hundreds of pieces from each sheet. Each piece has an area of approximately one square inch .
I have overcome the problem of resin marks on the surfaces of the materials. It is only the cut edges I am concerned about.
I have a found that a few of the materials I have tested do not leave loose soot on the edges which comes off when handled.
They do darken the cut edges ( charring ? ) but that is expected and acceptable.
What I am interested in is the differences between the common materials which produce soot when laser cut and the uncommon materials which do not.
I suspect that it depends more on which type of glues are used than on the species of wood.
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